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L jLi. ! < J t
'Cbe Conservative * 5
"plain people" adored him , and pro
nounced him a great man. Old party
leaders of his district , shrewdly , as they
thought , made use of this fact to win a
democratic memher of congress by
nominating Mr. Bryan. This was be
fore the dazzling opportunities of free
silver had burst upon him as a heavenly
vision. His promoters , of course , ex
pected simply to use him. When he be
gan to provide for reelection , however ,
he at once used , them , and in a charac
teristic way. The votes of the free-
silver populists , who were becoming nu
merous in the district , were needed to
Overcome the large republican plurality.
Mr. Bryan reasoned that the old-timers
would vote for him anyway , for the sake
of tariff reform , then the leading .party
issue , which they did under protest ,
while he gathered the plain populists
about his free-silver banner. In his
speeches in that campaign , he would
publicly list those democrats who were
against free silver , and who also had
any appearance of being financially
prosperous or solvent , as "bankers" and
emissaries of the "money power. " This
clever device was successful in a remote
rural district ; but when the whole
country came to be his battlefield , fear
of the untrustworthiness of so large a
part of his forces , enlisted in such a way ,
frightened away countless numbers of
those who were natural opponents of the
republican party. Those who naturally
became his lieutenants , under this ultra-
plain-people programme , were found
wanting in capacity and influence when
the greater test came. Of course , also ,
thousands and , perhaps , millions of the
plain people whom he had rallied ,
proved unreliable and surrendered to
the "belly" argument. This original
and persistent characteristic of Mr.
Bryan illustrates why he has always
been , in fact , the leader of the populists ,
without subscribing , to their specific
principles.
OLD FORT KEARNEY AGAIN.
Mr. William Lowe , of Minersville ,
has very obligingly ransacked his recol
lections of the year 1847 for the benefit
of THE CONSERVATIVE , and we are ac
cordingly enabled to give some further
facts , supplementing the article on the
first Fort Kearney in the issue of May 28.
The impression gained from the War
Department's records , that the Oregon
Battalion marched part way towards
Grand Island before being diverted to
Table Creek , seems to have been erro
neous. Mr. Lowe , who accompanied
the battalion hither from Fort Leaven-
worth in the capacity of civilian team
ster , knows nothing of such a transaction
He says the column followed the course
of the river pretty closely , coming up on
the west side , naturally. He says they
crossed the Big Nemaha just below the
present Falls City ; the crossing was dif
ficult , and the battalion was held back
to help the wagon and artillery trains
make it ; this had to bo done "by hand. "
As to the Pottawattamie emigration ,
Mr. Lowe says that the Pottawattamies
simply did emigrate in the winter of
1847-48. They were old neighbors of
his. Ho was born near their original
seat in Monroe county , Michigan ; came
across them again in LaPorto County ,
Indiana ; and found them for the third
time here that winter , as they were on
their way from western Iowa , where
they had had then- unsteady home for a
while , to new quarters to the south ; on
the Kaw River , he says. They went in
bands , some on one shore , some on the
other , and some by water.
The English who had been in charge
of the block-house since the preceding
year Mr. Lowe says was undoubtedly
one of several brothers of that name
who lived across the river , in the region
on the bank west of Hamburg to which
the name of McKissick is attached.
Iowa was pretty well settled , but to the
best of his knowledge there were no set
tlers at all in this part of Nebraska. The
squatters spoken of by Colonel Kearney
as owning ( or claiming ) all the desira
ble timber land in the vicinity , and as
trafficking in liquor with the .Indians ,
must he thinks have been located across
the river. The Indians would make oc
casional visits to the Table Creek neigh
borhood , having no permanent village ,
but just coming in with their traveling
tepees and staying until the spirit moved
them to go somewhere else ; and they
would go over the river for whiskey ,
which was not hard to get. He recalls
one chief of the Otoes , White Water
by name , who prohibited the use of
liquor among his band , and finding , on
one of these visits , that a keg had come
to camp , he vanished with his .following
during the night.
Mr. Lowe speaks of the discrepancy
in the original survey of the Iowa-Mis
souri line , which he says ran at first
above Sidney. He does not know
whether there was any trail leading to
Nebraska City or not ; the wagon-train
of course followed in the track of the
battalion. He thinks it likely , however ,
that the latter did have a trace of some
kind to guide thorn ; and as one or two
parties had traveled between Fort Leav-
enworth and this place during the year
preceding , he is no doubt right in regard
to this.
He himself was retained after the
teamsters were paid off , \o assist in
herding the cattle of the party , which
he says were put on the islands down
the river , so that it was easy to keep
track of them. He would ride up and
down the bank , and if he saw any
tracks leading away from the island he
would follow and drive the anima ;
back , and then return to his tent. Major
Dougherty was in charge of the live
stock , according to his recollection , and
one Needles , also from Missouri , was ap
pointed by him to their care during the
winter at a dollar a day ; but illness in
; ho Needles family recalling him to
Vlissouri , he delegated his duties to Mr.
Lowe.
The migrations of this old gentleman's
'ainily illustrate the way the west was
'ormiiig in the 20's and 30's. Starting
from Michigan about 1828 , they spent a
few years in northwestern Indiana ; be
ing driven thence by the big frost of
June , 1888 , they pushed westward , pass
ing the site of Chicago when there was
not a store there , only some kind of a
shop kept by a lone Frenchman ; he re
members their camp there , and has never
been there since. Presently they came
to Rock Island , then called "Stevason ; "
thence they made their way to Cairo ,
where Mr. Lowe senior thought seriously
of settling , but abandoned the idea be
cause he thought it unhealthy. Up the
Missouri they came , therefore , to St.
Louis , and made their home for a time
at a now settlement called Cooperstown
near Boonville ; and in 1842 they ad
vanced to Atchison County , Missouri ,
where they were living when the young
man heard of the opening for teamsters
at the fort in 1847.
He was there when Kearney returned
from California in August , and recalls
the fuss and the firing of cannon on that
occasion. He says General Kearney
clapped Fremont in irons as soon as he
got him to the fort ; he could have seen
Fremont at that time by going three
miles ; many people did so. He is wit
ness to the fact that Kearney was not
a popular officer ; if I am not mistaken ,
he calls him an "old rascal. " His hereto
to this day is the commander who com
pelled such enthusiasm in the breasts of
the westerners of his time , Colonel
Doniphan , whose name ho pronounces
"Donathau. " A. T. RICHARDSON.
THE NEW PARTY.
EDITOR CONSERVATIVE : I see THE
CONSERVATIVE is advocating the forma
tion of a new political party. Allow mete
to suggest , as the first plank , the repeal
of the infamous salary-grab act of 1878 ,
thereby rescuing our municipal , state ,
and national public offices out of the
grasp of avaricious pot-house politicians ,
who are using all our public offices to
make serfs of the industrial classes.
Sixteen-to-one silver fanatics are a small
menace to American institutions , com
pared to the political knaves rioting in
our municipal , state and national legis
lation. Trot out your new party on a
patriotic platform. Respectfully ,
J. B. COREY.
Pittsburg , Penn. , May 27 , 1901.
NEBRASKA VERSUS KANSAS.
If Paul Morton has really been offered
. iO,000 a year to manage the traffic of
the Harriuiaii railroads , Nebraska City ,
Nebraska , Has lola , Kansas , bested in
the matter of rearing valuable citizens.
The government , which is liberal , only
pays Brigadier General Funston , $5,500
a year. Atohison Globe.
